Best Ferry Ride

Golden Eagle

New Yorkers seem to find love on the Staten Island Ferry. Our best chance is the Golden Eagle. Oh, there are the free ferries, of course, the Brussels being especially cute, but romance requires time, and scenic backdrop, and a long buildup. You wind through peaceful, seemingly insignificant farmland, and then, when you think you can go no farther, you see the sign: Golden Eagle Ferry. You drive past the swampy pale-green scum of the past, out onto a narrow promontory where storm-slain trees float in the water like prior lovers, drifting harmless beneath the soft cottonwoods. The river flows by your window, and dragonflies buzz the future. You wait a bit (lost art), then glide on board, and without preamble you're surrounded by water, taking a journey that will land you in the paradisal bluffs of Calhoun County. The rest is up to you.